In Karen Pulfer’s Focht’s latest Expression of Faith video, Pastor Ricky Floyd, from The Pursuit of God Church in Frayser, walks the streets of his declining neighborhood saying prayers. Frayser has some of the highest rates of poverty, crime, teen pregnancy and infant mortality in the Memphis area. However, there are many forces at work to uplift the troubled area.

Daniel Davidson, a veteran who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, says the trials of life on the front lines brought him closer to God. Here, Davidson reflects upon feeling God’s presence in the still of the night while on guard duty in Afghanistan, as Chaplin Benita Livingston, with the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Memphis, listens to, and prays with him.

Master gardener, and retired Navy Chaplin, Anne Krekelberg talks about how she finds God in her garden, and how being a good steward of the land is part of her spiritual journey. She is learning to live with the many critters that inhabit her wooded lot in Bartlett. Her home will be on the Third Annual Memphis Area Master Gardner’s tour, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. today (Saturday June 2).

Prayers from the Pub: 2010 International Blues Challenge Champion Grady Champion sings a prayer of thanksgiving while performing at Huey’s. He says his blues is very spiritual and he believes his music touches people spiritually. Champion is one of 22 children. He is singing “Thank You for Giving me the Blues,” a song that has been nominated for Song of the Year for the 2012 Blues Music Awards, which will be May 10th in Memphis.

An Easter meditation. Behold, I make all things new! Revelation 21:5 set to photographs, harp and additional scripture from 2 Corinthians: “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!” 2 Corinthians 5:17

Find these photographs in Sunday’s Viewpoint section, along with ideas about the meaning of Easter from members of our community.

Happy Easter!

Wayne Jackson of the Memphis Horns, who received a Lifetime Achievement Grammy Award on Feb. 11, talks about his magical journey as a sideman for many of the greatest musicians of our time, and the special friendship he shared with Andrew Love, the other half of the Horns. Wayne gives the credit to God, whom he believes has directed his path all these years. “I know he’s real.”

Rejoice; a meditation. This is the day the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it. Psalms 118:24. These horses at Shelby Farms are the backdrop for reflection on the scripture.

After Hurricane Katrina Bob Sunda was put off the river boat he worked on at the cobblestones in downtown Memphis and given $200. He found gigs in and around town before he becoming a teacher at Rhodes College and settling into playing for a church in Nesbit, Mississippi. Here, he speaks about how all music is a prayer and sings his interpretation of “Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus.”